NEW YORK -- Well, this is a fine dilemma for the dopey-eyed nostalgia peddlers, the Church of Baseball purists, the Kleenex salesmen and devotees of the Emerald Chessboard. The New York Mets and Chicago Cubs aren't just playing for the National League pennant, starting Saturday. They're also locked in a "Oh yeah?/Take that!" fight to settle another question: Who has had it worse?
Is it Cubs fans, who think they've cornered the market on pain in the 107 years since their last World Series win and 70 years since their last pennant? Or is it long-suffering Mets fans, who are much like Cubs fans -- just without the sense of humor.
Do you know what an Upper West Side shrink charges?
The Cubs are adorable when they lose. The Mets are just derided as inept. The Cubs are trying to snap the infamous Curse of the Billy Goat. The Mets are still dealing with the Curse of Bobby Bonilla, to whom they'll be paying deferred money until the sun burns itself out. The Cubs have Carmine, the super-computer who knows all and spews out analytics. In New York, Carmine would be that mob boss you can't pull anything over on.
And don't forget, while Cubs fans get to enjoy all the charming pubs and rooftop viewing areas just beyond the ivy-covered outfield wall at Wrigley Field, do you know what the Mets fans' scenic view is? Those chop shops across the street from Citi Field that outflanked all attempts to get them evicted when the stadium was built a handful of years ago.
Mets owner Fred Wilpon paid for much of Citi Field's construction with his own money. Yet instead of being seen as a homegrown prince of the city, the Brooklyn kid who grew up with Sandy Koufax and made good, Fred and his son Jeff are derided around New York as the Wil-Ponzis. Why? Because of the way the Mets' payroll shrank after the Wilpons lost millions in the pyramid scheme run by their longtime investment pal Bernie Madoff, who's now breaking big rocks into little ones in prison.
Such lampooning is a far cry from the destiny that awaits Chicago genius of baseball operations Theo Epstein if his re-booted Cubs do win the World Series. Everyone knows how young Theo brought joy to New England by presiding over the Red Sox's first World Series in a trillion years. Now he may just punch his ticket to the Hall of Fame -- at the mere age of, what is he now? 17? -- if this team breaks the Cubs' title drought. Hell, even Steve Bartman might not only get to come out of hiding -- maybe the team will pay him reparations for pain and suffering and let him ride like a homecoming king in one of the parade convertibles.
When Epstein asked for patience as he built this Chicago team the "right" way, Cubs fans listened. That would never, ever happen in New York.
Perhaps the difference is just owing to a clash of Midwest vs. East Coast values. The City of Broad Shoulders vs. the City of the Cold Shoulder.
Cubbies fans are still warmed by memories of Ernie Banks and that sunbeam smile he'd break into while repeating his famous line of "Let's play two!" or the late Harry Caray leading "Take Me Out to the Ballgame" singalongs. New York is the city where the cynics never sleep.
The best-remembered line in Mets history is a dead heat between Tug McGraw and his rousing "You gotta believe!" and Yankee import Casey Stengel, who said of his 1962 Mets club that lost 120 times, "Can't anybody here play this game?" The Mets' most quotable broadcaster was Ralph Kiner, who became famous for malaprops such as, "All of his saves have come in relief appearances" and "Kevin McReynolds stops at third and he scores!"
The Cubs did have the Black Cat game where Ron Santo got spooked in the on-deck circle, and poor Leo Durocher, who presided over the 1969 Cubs' collapse that allowed the Mets to go slingshotting by Chicago for the National League East title, muttered, "If I knew we were going to lose eight straight, I would've just played nine pitchers every day and let everyone go home and rest."
But not so fast. The Mets had their own mortifying fold in 2007, inconceivably blowing a seven-game division lead with only 17 games to play to the Phillies, who were led in part that year by Chase Utley. That's right. The same Utley who, with the Dodgers, slid hard into second during the National League Division Series and broke the leg of Mets shortstop Ruben Tejada this postseason.
Now look: The Mets' new starting shortstop is Wilmer Flores, a guy who began crying in the middle of a July 30 game when he was told -- erroneously, as it turned out -- that he'd been traded for Milwaukee's Carlos Gomez when, in reality, the deal was quickly called off after Gomez's medical charts couldn't, um ... ho boy, oh geez ... pass the Mets' scrutiny.
How do you think that make-up phone call between Mets general manager Sandy Alderson and Flores went?
"Wilmer! Trade schmade! We love you baby! Buckets and buckets more than Gomez's bum hamstring."
No wonder Jerry Seinfeld is a Mets fan. The New York Times called it "one of most surreal moments" for the Mets since -- well, when? When they were blasted for making Willie Randolph fly to the West Coast with the 2008 team and then fired him in the wee hours of their first night there?
After a win.
Maybe folks in both cities should just let all the angst go. Epstein is. He insists all the bad history is water under the bridge (or sleeping with the fishes, taking a dirt nap, as they say in New York).
Better to brace yourself for what's next. It's Chicago-New York, the Aldermen vs. the Amazin' Aldersons. Cubs pitchers Jake Arrieta and Jon Lester trying to outdo the Mets' rotation of Matt Harvey, Noah Syndergaard and Jacob deGrom. Chicago sluggers Anthony Rizzo and Kyle Schwarber against Mets stretch-run heroes Yoenis Cespedes and Daniel Murphy, who -- don't look now -- are both scheduled to be free agents after this joyride of a season because, well, they are the Mets.
Arrieta and deGrom are both candidates for the Cy Young Award. They're among the reasons the Cubs and Mets are seen as rising young teams who arrived in this National League Championship Series ahead of schedule.
Whichever team wins and moves on to the World Series will make its city euphoric.
And whichever team loses will just shrug and say there's always next year.
Or the year after that ...